Best English Dictionary For Smart Phones, Incl Iphone and Android?

[CzarThustraThusSpake]

Here is what I feel to be one of the most interesting topics, one about which almost everyone here has a suggestion or an opinion.

We have English speakers here on the forum from all over, from the UK, where English almost began, to the USA, which perfected it, to Australia and India which are on different subcontinents.

My question is which one should I use for best results on my smart phone?

I might use technical words, old words, new words, dirty words, and funny words, and I might mispell them. I just want to know which dictionary will sit on my smart phone and be the easiest to use, while providing the most help about the English language, its usage, word meanings, everything useful in a dictionary.

I used to used an old OED, that blue thing everyone seemed to keep on their study desks, but the print was too small, so they gave you a magnifying glass. Not so good.

Then i had a few others, because I really like dictionaries.

The reason I am now thinking of using the Merriam-Webster is this:

1. Years ago, I often would come across the word "bounder" in the literature I was reading. Every time I went to lookup this word in my dictionaries, I could not find it. The dictionaries I used were printed in the US, most of them anyway. They just did not include bounder.

2. Just this moment, I downloaded Merriam-Webster's dictionary from Google Play. And i decided to test it with "bounder". Sure enough, bounder was there. So I am very happy now.

3. But bounder does not tell the whole story, because there are too many other criteria by which to judge a dictionary.

Maybe we can get into talking about the English Thai dictionaries, or the English Thai, but I think that has been done before on the Thai section of this forum. Therefore, please just keep to English dictionaries which can be installed on the smart phones everyone carries.

Free or Purchased, this does not matter. We are just talking English dictionaries which are most complete, and easy to use.

I know there are a few writers here on this forum, maybe they would have an opinion. There might be one or two wordsmythes here, too.

Anyone who has a good suggestion should explain it here.

I prefer that the paid variety be no more than about Baht 100, just to keep the ads off I think.

Also, it is best to discuss those dictionaries which everyone can try and opine about for free.

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One more important point: It is really nice when there is some way to link these dictionaries to a text editor, or other programs so that when you are reading from Calibre, or Writing an email or a comment somewhere, then you can see the mispelling and get it automatically corrected, or you can get synonyms for words you encounter while reading Heart of Darkness on your Calibre.

[attrayant]

I'm a big fan of descriptivist lexicography, so Merriam-Webster is my dictionary of choice. I'm also a fan of their "Ask the Editor" videos that discuss some often contentious and sometimes confusing words (although this feature is not accessible via their smartphone app).

One more important point: It is really nice when there is some way to link these dictionaries to a text editor, or other programs

Most word processing applications come with their own dictionaries, and I'm not aware of any that can be detached in preference of some external spelling resource. If one exists, I'd be interested to know about it.

Edited February 27, 2014 by attrayant

[CzarThustraThusSpake]

I'm a big fan of descriptivist lexicography, so Merriam-Webster is my dictionary of choice. I'm also a fan of their "Ask the Editor" videos that discuss some often contentious and sometimes confusing words (although this feature is not accessible via their smartphone app).

One more important point: It is really nice when there is some way to link these dictionaries to a text editor, or other programs

Most word processing applications come with their own dictionaries, and I'm not aware of any that can be detached in preference of some external spelling resource. If one exists, I'd be interested to know about it.

As far as I know, I think you can link different dictionaries or glossaries to the Kindle, or Kindle for Android, to be used on a smart phone. Sometimes you also need to link special dictionaries to MS Word, or at least link the spellings of words. I have not done this before, but I know you can link various dictionaries to Google Chrome browser for use when editing or submitting a comment from this browser, for example.

I am just now beginning to learn more about dictionaries from the "electronic" point of view, because I now need these to edit reports for business/study which are sent from PCs and Laptops, and even from tablets. Also, sometimes a good dictionary comes in very handy when trying to explain a word to the many Kon Thai who are very interested in English. When you have a good easy to use English dictionary on your phone, then on a train or a bus you can at least have something to talk about with your fellow passengers. I think people here are just about all very interested in asking questions about English. I do not teach, but I like to be able to answer English related questions.

Edited February 27, 2014 by CzarThustraThusSpake